Hollowest of Halos
by thekindlyones
Summary: Flack's a seasoned homicide detective from a line of NYPD blue blood who likes his coffee plain and black. Rowen's a newly delegated public liaison for the crime lab who likes her tea with honey and a splash of vanilla. They're what you'd call complete opposites. Don Flack/OC; Season 6 onwards
1. Prologue: Ruth

**Hollowest of Halos**

_Prologue: Ruth_

**_Disclaimer:_**_ I don't own nothing that isn't created in my head._

* * *

Rowen Loewe was sure that the gods above had a fond habit of ganging up against her on the days she needed things to go without a hitch.

It was a cold morning, as expected from a Monday in November, and the 27-year-old had readied herself to fight the murderous subway crowd when the first crack of thunder rumbled deeply above the din of New York City. The forecasted weather of a chilly but mildly clear day was obviously misreported when Rowen found herself caught halfway between the subway station and her apartment as thick and dark rainclouds gathered overhead.

Apparent that she was going to be drenched anyway, Rowen gave up the intent of heading back to her apartment for an umbrella and decided to continue on her route to the station, hoping silently that she would be able to make it underground before the first wave of rain fell hard on the New Yorkers pushing passed her.

New York City was a brutal and cold concrete jungle. It was a place filled with competition and rivalry – for better jobs, better food, and better home – and everything was a contest to the people living there.

Even trying to get on the morning subway was like a fight to death in itself.

Having gotten used to being pushed and rushed around without a word of apology or a look of remorse, Rowen was not in the least bit surprised when someone slammed into her and threw her off balance towards the curb.

The frustration, however, was rising rapidly inside the normally patient young woman at how the crowd continued to rage on, how the skies persisted in darkening and how things never went her way when she needed them to.

So, Rowen turned around, ready to give the ill-mannered person a piece of her mind when she stopped and frowned, her attention having being caught by the thin figure struggling to push herself towards the side where a construction railing stood.

The teenage girl, dressed in a rumpled uniform with a thick knitted scarf wrapped tightly around her neck, staggered uneasily on her feet. Her face was a pale, almost ghostly, ashen colour and sweat was beading on her hairline. Rowen would have thought her to be drunk or on drugs if it weren't for the way she cradled her stomach and the darker patch of fabric on her navy blue coat.

Quickly, Rowen pushed herself through the crowd, ignoring the indignant complains and cursing, and made her way to the teenager, reaching just in time as her legs gave way under her weight.

"Miss, are you okay?"

"H-hel… _help_."

Rowen sat her down and leaned her against the construction barrier gingerly. Her eyes roved over her form and stopped at the unmistakable red seeping from her hands at her abdomen. Quickly, she took off her cardigan and pressed it firmly against the spot before turning to see two women – a blonde and a redhead – watching them in worry.

"Call 911!"

The blonde nodded frantically and Rowen turned back to the teenager.

"Hey, what's your name?" She asked. The teenager shook her head and let out a choked cry. "Tell me your name, sweetie."

Instead of answering her, the girl pulled her bloodied hand from under Rowen's and reached up to tug fruitlessly at the scarf knotted around her neck. Another choking noise fell from her pale lips, as she pulled harder at the offending apparel. Assuming that the scarf was making it even harder for her to breathe, Rowen turned to the redhead and instructed her to remove it as her hands were occupied with trying to slow down the bleeding on the teenager's stomach.

What happened next was something Rowen had not anticipated.

When the scarf fell away, it revealed a clotted puncture hole on the teenager's pale neck. The tightly wounded fabric had kept a firm pressure on the wound, allowing the blood flow to slow down significantly. Now that the scarf was removed, however, it took all of three seconds for the first high-pressured squirt to splatter across the front of Rowen's sweater before bright red blood was pumped out in fast, steady beats.

Rowen grabbed the scarf and held it back against the throbbing wound quickly, hoping to staunch the bleeding, while the redhead staggered back, her face drained of any colour.

The blonde kneeled beside her friend and looked towards Rowen. "The ambulance's coming, but in this traffic…"

Rowen pursed her lips. She looked back at the teenager who was staring at her with tear-stained and unfocused brown eyes. "It'll be okay. You just stay with me, alright? What's your name, honey?"

"Ru-Ruth." The teenager stammered, face crumpling with frightened tears. Her breaths came in short, sharp gasps. "Mommy. I want Mommy."

"I know, sweetie. The ambulance's coming. You just stay with me, okay? We'll find your mom later." Rowen encouraged. "Can you tell me what happened?"

"Lee…" the teenager whispered. "L-lee…"

Rowen moved closer to her as her voice grew significantly lower, only to hear choked noises and muffled words, none of which she could make any sense of. Before she could do anything, Ruth's eyes had rolled into the back of their sockets and slipped close as the last of her breath left her battered body.

Rowen looked from Ruth's pale face to her own bloodstained sweater and sighed.

This was not the impression she wanted to make on the first day of her new career.

* * *

**R&R, people!**

_xo, thekindlyones_


	2. Rowen

**Hollowest of Halos**

_Chapter One: Rowen_

* * *

The windshield wipers stopped their repetitious motions as the engine to the car was turned off with a short shudder. The man sitting in the driver's seat peered through the window with bleary blue eyes and gave an angry grunt at the ceaseless rain pelting against the glass.

Don Flack hated rainy days. And Monday mornings.

So when he was woken up from a short night's rest by a call about a dead body on the corner of 65th and Bloomingdale a half hour before he was meant to wake up, it had put him in an irritable mood. Which, worsened instantly when he looked out his bedroom window to see that it was pouring, because rain, Mondays and mornings never went well together.

Not to Flack.

Rain meant water, and water meant vital evidence could be washed away before the CSIs got there fast enough to collect them. This would delay the team's ability to catch the criminal and who knows what they could do with this short window of freedom?

And Mondays? Who liked Mondays? Nobody, that's who.

"Stupid weather." Flack muttered darkly as he tightened his coat around him before opening his car door. The cold chill surrounded him and he braced himself for the uncomfortable wetness that would ensue.

Before he could even shut his car door, a rookie had rushed up to him with bright eyes and an excitable smile. He was drenched from the rain and yet, nothing seemed to have brought his mood down.

Flack grunted and decided to add cheery morning people to the long list of things he hated.

"Good morning, Detective Flack!" chirped Gozzard.

Flack rolled his eyes impatiently. "Where's the vic?"

"Right over there," Gozzard pointed to a construction barrier where a body clad in a school uniform was sitting against. "We've got three direct witnesses and a bunch of other gatherers."

"Have you started interviewing them?"

Gozzard nodded. A self-satisfied grin tugged on his face. "Yes, I did. But I figured you'd want to talk to the witnesses yourself."

"Where are they?"

"The two ladies by that ambulance," Gozzard directed. "And the brunette sitting on the bench."

Flack looked towards where he had pointed. The brunette on the bench was holding an umbrella with the NYPD logo blazoned across its surface while the redhead was breathing harshly into the oxygen mask the paramedic was holding to her face. The blonde sitting beside her was merely staring into space blankly.

The detective stalked off without another word, deciding to talk to the brunette first. She was the only one who looked calm enough to talk, which he made a mental note of because clues like that could come in handy from time to time.

"Excuse me?" The young woman tilted her umbrella back and looked up at Flack through eyes that were shadowed by what he called 'hippie bangs'. He let out a low whistle at the blood staining the front of her grey sweater and flashed his badge at her. "I'm Detective Don Flack from the NYPD. I was told you were there with the victim?"

"Yes, hi." She stood up then, slinging her bag across her shoulder and straightening herself to her full height. Flack was mildly surprised that she was only slightly shorter than him even though she was wearing flat-heeled shoes. At 6'2", the detective towered over almost every woman he met easily, and most of them had to crane their heads back in order to meet his eyes. The young woman, however, merely had to raise her chin a little for blue to clash with blue.

"I'm Rowen Loewe." She said, and raised the umbrella higher to include Flack under the shelter voluntarily. Then, she stretched her hand out to him, not having noticed that it was still covered in the victim's blood. Flack looked down at the proffered hand with a distasteful countenance and appraised her with brows raised high on his forehead.

Rowen looked down at her own hand in confusion when the detective made no move to take it. She flushed at the realization that it was still sticky with blood and took it back with a quiet word of apology.

"Let's take it from the beginning," prompted Flack brusquely. He flipped his notebook open and readied his pen. "What happened?"

"Um, well, I was on my way to the station when I found Ruth –"

"Ruth?" Flack cut in with a frown. "You know her name?"

"Yeah, I managed to get that from her before she died."

The detective hummed noncommittally and waved his pen. "Carry on,"

Rowen spent the next few minutes relating everything to Flack, who scribbled the every bit of information on the little pad of his without looking up. Every now and then, he would throw her one of the standard questions asked during such procedures, all the while with a small scowl on his face.

"And the blood on your sweater?"

"From her neck." Rowen answered steadily. "I think the scarf managed to slow down the bleeding enough to clot it, but when we removed it, the pressure lifted and the wound reopened."

Flack raised an eyebrow at her. "You seem to know a lot about stab wounds."

"I've had experiences with it."

"I see." He replied easily, although a hint of skepticism burned through his eyes at the look he gave Rowen. "Anything else?"

"She said something about a 'Lee' when I asked her what happened." She said. "Oh, and her mom. She was asking for her mom too. That was all I could get before she died."

"Lee?" Flack asked. "Like a name?"

"Perhaps," Rowen shrugged. "I'm not sure. It could mean a lot of things."

"You don't say," the detective muttered under his breath. Rowen frowned and pursed her lips at his surly attitude. "Anything else?"

She shook her head.

"I'm going to need your contact information." Flack requested just as a man and a woman clad in matching dark jackets with the words CSI: NY emblazoned across the back of it came up to him. The woman, with a head of wild corkscrew curls, clapped her hand on the detective's shoulder in greeting while the man nodded his head at him.

"Flack,"

"Morning Mac." Flack returned before directing his attention back to Rowen. "As I was saying, I'll need –What are you – _Hey_! Stop!"

Rowen ignored him and followed after the two CSIs towards the crime scene.

"Mr. Taylor?" She called out, coming to a stop just in front of the cordoned area. "Mac Taylor?"

Both CSIs turned. The woman looked bemused as she placed her kit on the ground while the man looked between the tape, Rowen and a scowling Flack.

Frowning, he appraised the girl with stern eyes. "Yes. You are?"

Rowen smiled brightly back at him. She stretched her hand towards him, once again forgetting that it was still coated in red and said, "Rowen Loewe. I'm the new public liaison for your crime lab?"

"_Ah,_ yes, we were expecting you." Mac said as Rowen took back her offered hand with a grimace. His critical grey eyes trailed over her bloodied attire, thin lips quirking up in a small half-smile. "Although, I must say in a better state."

Rowen looked down at her own clothes with a wry smile. She flushed red and mustered a forced chuckle as she tried not to panic under the scrutinizing glare from Mac.

"Yeah, um, this is _not_ the first impression I am hoping to make." She sputtered.

"We'll need your clothes for processing," The other CSI said as she came up to them. She was a pretty woman with a tall sharp nose, a pair of almond-shaped olive eyes and an easy going smile. "Stella Bonasera,"

"I'd offer you my hand, but…" Rowen trailed off as she moved towards Flack to include him under the shelter of her umbrella again, prompting him to send her a weird look. She shrugged lightly in return. "Nobody likes to be wet."

Stella chuckled and reached into her pants pocket for a set of keys. "Don," She called out, throwing the keys at the detective who caught it smoothly. "Why don't you take Ms. Loewe back to the precinct first so she can wash all the blood away. I've got an extra set of clothes in my locker she can change into."

"I'm not done here," Flack stated, nodding towards the two other witnesses in the ambulance. "I can get the rookie on crack to take her?"

"And trust him with my keys?" Stella scoffed. "No chance."

"We'll take over for you," offered Mac. He bent to put his kit on the ground and proceeded to pull out a set of latex gloves. "What have you got for us so far?"

"But Mac…"

"We've got you covered, Flack." Stella emphasized in place of her supervisor. "I'm sure Ms. Loewe would appreciate the change of clothes. Let's not torture the new girl now."

"You can just call me Rowen," Rowen piped up.

Ignoring her, Flack sighed roughly and conceded to the two CSIs' decision. He then proceeded to relay all that he had gotten from Rowen while she stayed quiet beside him, settling instead to watch the way the three of them worked.

It was interesting, to see how well the three of them functioned together. Mac and Stella would make a comment or two about evidences they found on Ruth's body to which Flack would then propose hypothetical situations that would then get all three of them on a possible way to tackle the case with. Rowen assumed this was the type of bond they had built from working with each other over the years.

When he was done, Flack ushered Rowen to his squad car begrudgingly. She pulled the umbrella from over their heads and bundled it up before returning it to Gozzard – who had been sending them an enthusiastic wave goodbye – with a quick word of appreciation to which he _beamed _in response at.

As Rowen slipped into the passenger seat of the sedan, she caught the last of Flack's string of angry mutterings as he cranked up the heat in the car. She stayed reticent, deciding to pretend she hadn't heard his little outburst and chose to stare out the window as the detective started the engine and began pulling the car out onto the main road.

Silence hung thick and heavy in the car for the next fifteen minutes, broken only by Flack's occasional grunts when a sudden thunder rumbled in the sky and his tendency to press on the car horn in a true New York fashion whenever they hit bad traffic. Rowen continued to stare out the window, turning her head slightly every now and then and pretending she wasn't stealing glances at the disgruntled detective beside her.

"Stupid weather,"

Rowen heard for the third time. Although she had been dreading the rain, she didn't think it was bad enough to curse at it three times in a row in the exact same words.

"It's not that bad." She said.

Flack turned his head towards her just as another car cut in front of him, causing him to hit his brakes just in time to avoid crashing into the bumper. A loud, ear-piercing honk accompanied the angry swears he launched at the reckless driver.

When he was done hurling abuses at the driver, Flack turned back to Rowen with an eyebrow quirked. "I'm sorry, what did you just say?"

"The rain," explained Rowen. She turned towards Flack. "It's not that bad actually. Troublesome and wet, yes. But the smell that comes right after when it ends is quite lovely. People call it '_petrichor'_."

"Oh. Uh, _right_." Flack looked flummoxed at her random remark. He shrugged and returned his attention to the road they were cruising on. Dark brows were lowered tightly over pale blue eyes. "In my line of work, the rain is an accomplice of the murderer. Doesn't matter if it smells good or not. As long as it destroys physical evidences and prolong the time it takes us to nab the criminal, I don't like it."

Rowen hummed and looked away again, not having anything to say to him in return. The silence surrounded the two again. While it seemed to not have affected her, Flack was growing visibly uncomfortable at the quietness after their very brief conversation about the rain and how it smells. Now that he was left with his own thoughts, he realized he had been rather short with her the whole morning, and Rowen did not deserve it one bit.

'_It wasn't as if she made the weather this way,' _Flack mused to himself, growing guiltier by the second._ 'Besides, she even offered him her umbrella without asking.'_

Sure she was a little strange with her offhanded comment but that didn't mean Flack should direct his annoyance at her too. His mother taught him better than that.

"Are you okay?" Rowen looked at him from the corner of her eyes. She had been watching him fidget in his seat for the past few minutes.

"Yes. Uh, I'm fine." Flack cleared his throat. "So, where are you from?"

"New York, born and raised." Rowen replied, unfazed by his sudden question. "I'm assuming you are too. Your accent's really strong."

"You hardly have one." Flack pointed out. "But yeah, I'm a New Yorker through and through." He paused. "Came from a line of NYPD cops too. You? Anyone in your family in law enforcement?"

"I'm the first,"

"So the crime lab's your first job?"

Rowen shook her head. "I was with the FBI for about a year and a half."

Flack almost slammed onto his brakes in surprise. "FBI? _You_ were in the FBI?"

"Yes," Rowen said simply. "Is there a problem?"

Flack rounded the car around the corner to the street on which the 12th precinct stood and eyed her carefully. "You just don't give off the federal vibe."

Not giving off the vibe was an understatement. To him, the young brunette didn't even look like she belonged anywhere _near_ the law enforcement industry. He took another glance at her clothes and overall demeanour and had to purse his lips in order to stop the snigger from coming out.

Dressed in a thick knitted grey sweater tucked into a black pencil skirt and dark leggings, Rowen looked more like an elementary school teacher than a media liaison for the crime lab. She even had on one of those colourful beaded bracelets he had seen adorning the wrists of children on the streets.

Even her voice didn't sound as if it belonged to someone who had worked with federal agencies. Her voice, much like her, was a contradiction. It was low, lower than Flack expected, but sweet; mellow but light and airy. It was as though there were different personalities to her voice.

'_First Gozzard and now her,'_ Flack thought. _'Were they just giving away the jobs to anyone now?'_

"You don't think I belong in law enforcement, do you?" Rowen asked, chuckling to herself when Flack startled visibly in his seat. "Don't worry. You're not the first. Nobody takes my word for it when I said I was working in the FBI."

'_I wonder why,'_ Flack thought.

"People always expected all FBI officers to have an strong, angry disposition, complete with bold eyebrows and a tendency to scream when nothing went right. Like an overcharged bull." She paused then, a faraway look in her eyes. "Although I did have a superior that reminded me of one…"

When Rowen drifted off and made no move to continue the conversation, Flack sighed and gave up, allowing the silence to befall them again. The brick front of the precinct came into view as he maneuvered the car carefully into the allocated parking space.

"Detective Flack?" The blue-eyed detective turned towards Rowen curiously. She held the seatbelt out to him. "I uh, got a little blood on your seatbelt. I'm sorry."

Flack cringed and made a mental note to get one of those bottles of chemical that removed bloodstains from the CSIs. "It's alright. Come on, let's get you changed out of those."

He led her into the precinct, aware of the stares and gasps from the officers and people around them at the sight of Rowen.

One of the officers came up to them, a hand resting on his gun as he shot the detective an incredulous look. "Flack? What the hell?"

"Later, Renault." Flack said, directing Rowen to the lift that would take them up to the crime lab.

* * *

Wow, _3 reviews, 3 favs and 8 subs_? I didn't know anyone still read CSI: NY fics nowadays! Thanks for the support and encouragement guys!

Anyways, I tried to look for the address or whereabouts of the crime lab in the show, but there wasn't any results. So i've decided to put the crime lab 32 floors above for the ease of my writing.

Remember **read **and **review**! :)

xo _thekindlyones_


End file.
